1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is in the field of eyeglasses, and has particular application in providing an improved method and apparatus for securing eyeglasses in the desired position while being worn.
2. Background of the Invention
The present invention is related to and improves upon an existing U.S. Pat. No. 5,956,118 issued to the present inventor on Sep. 21, 1999.
Eyeglasses, also commonly known as spectacles or glasses, comprise an instrument or device including lenses or prisms mounted in a plastic or metal frame to hold them in position in front of the eyes, for the purpose of aiding vision or compensating for various visual defects such as myopia or astigmatism for example. In addition to correcting visual defects, eyeglasses are also commonly worn to protect the user's eyes from harm caused by environmental or workplace hazards. For example, eyeglasses consisting of lenses of various shades or colors, and often manufactured with a protective ultraviolet coating, are used to protect the eyes from the harmful rays of the sun, or from the glare of very bright lights. In another example, in order to protect the eyes from the actinic rays of welding flames, workers wear eyeglasses having lenses of a much deeper tint. In still other examples, machinists and other factory workers wear eyeglasses or goggles having lenses of great strength to shield their eyes from flying particles of metal or some other hazardous material, and aviators and racing drivers wear protective goggles to shield their eyes from the wind and other airborne particles. Protective eyeglasses are also commonly worn in many court sports as racquetball and basketball, or other sports where equipment used or close proximity between participants causes a potential hazard to the eyes.
The most common form of eyeglasses consists of a pair of glass or plastic lenses mounted within a metal or plastic frame resting the bridge of the nose that is and usually supported by a pair of nose pads for a nose piece shaped to provide a comfortable fit. A common frame for eyeglasses consists of bows, or arms, extending to the rear of the frame from end pieces or temples on each opposite side of the frame end. The bows are usually hinged and sometimes permanently attached at temple areas of the frame. A common eyeglasses frame is held in place on the user's head by inward spring pressure applied to the arms causing them to grip the head from the sides, or by curved ends of the arms that hook around behind the user's ears. A combination of spring-loaded arms and hooked ends is often utilized.
Another less common form of eyeglasses, known as pinch nose glasses. have frames that are held in place by pressure on the bridge of the nose, such as by a nosepiece utilizing spring pressure or some form of resilient material. Single lenses, known in the art has monocles, are used to correct the sight of just one eye and are held in place by wedging the lens in the orbit of the eye. Eyeglasses with a handle attached to the frame, rather than utilizing spring-loaded arms (for example), is occasionally employed for reading, and are commonly referred to as lorgnettes.
As previously mentioned many attempts have been made over the many years since the development of eyeglasses to hold the frame of the eyeglasses in place while worn so that the lenses mounted within the frame rest in their proper position in front of the eyes without undue movement. It is especially important for wearers of eyeglasses with corrective lenses to maintain the proper distance between the lens and the surface of the eye so as to best utilize the corrective properties of the lenses. For example, if corrective eyeglasses worn by a user according to conventional art are moved or bumped into an uneven position in front of the eyes, optimal vision correction is lost and the view through the lens can become distorted.
A common problem encountered by users wearing conventional eyeglasses is a tendency for the frame to slide downward on the bridge of the nose due to a combination of the forces of gravity and the movement of by the user. This problem is exacerbated when the user perspires and the skin surface of the user's nose becomes slippery, thus increasing the tendency for the eyeglasses to slide downwardly and outwardly from the face. The holding effectiveness of temple arms with ends that hook around the ears is also diminished by perspiration occurring behind the ear which causes the surface of the skin behind the ear to become increasingly slippery as well, causing the hooked ends to lose their grip. The problem is further exacerbated when external forces are applied to eyeglasses worn by an active user such as an athlete performing strenuous sports including running or riding a bike down a bumpy trail.
The formed nosepiece or nose pads, used in conjunction with temple arms having ends that hook around the ears, which are the structures commonly used in conventional eyeglasses, often does not adequately provide the fit and support many users desire. The shape, width and slope of the bridge of the nose can vary greatly from different users, as can the circumference of the head and distance between the ears and bridge of the nose. Because of these physical disparities between users no single combination of temple arms and nosepiece or nose pads provides optimal fit, hold and support for most users. Eyeglasses frames must often be adjusted in many ways for different users in order to obtain the desired secure and comfortable fit. For example, a user having a nose bridge thinner than average must adjust the pair of nose pads of the eyeglasses, if so equipped, inward to diminish the space between each other. The opposite is true for a user with a nose bridge wider than is average, necessitating an outward adjustment of the nose pads to obtain the proper fit. As previously mentioned, the circumference of the user's head and the distance between the bridge of the nose and the ears varies greatly between users and necessitating and additional adjustment of the hooked ends of, if so equipped, and the amount of space between the temple arms. Many modern eyeglasses are furnished with temple arms having a straighter end with a sometimes ergonomically shaped cover. usually made of a textured rubberized material, instead of a hooked end that partially wraps around behind the ear as in more conventional art. Such a temple arm end covering is viewed by many to be trendy and fashionable, but can provide the necessary anchoring of the temple arms only in dry and optimal conditions. As is the case with temple arms having ends that wrap around the ear such straighter, rubber-covered temple arms are also very susceptible to slippage due to perspiration behind the ears or being subjected to otherwise wet conditions in the environment such as rain, snow or the like.
Attempts have been made to integrate structures, such as headbands, into the structure of the eyeglasses for creating a more effective and secure mounting of the eyeglasses to the head of the user. One illustrative example of such known structures is taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,930,985 to Laschober. The Laschober patent teaches two different attachment members or structures for attaching a headband to the frame. One structure, shown in FIGS. 1 through 4 of the Laschober patent, includes an attachment member mounted on the headband with an arm and tab adapted for engaging an aperture formed in a connector member mounted on the frame. A significant drawback for this structure of the Laschober patent is that the user must press the tab on the arm inward (through the aperture) to disengage the tab from the aperture and release the attachment member from the connector member. Thus, the user cannot simply disengage the attachment member from the connector member of Laschober, but the user must attempt to press the relatively small tab, a task that does not appear to capable of being performed while the Laschober apparatus is on the head of the user so that the user could release the headband from the frame while the Laschober device is being worn on the user's head. Instead, it appears that the Laschober device would have to be removed from the user's head first, and then the attachment member could be released from the connector member. This required step makes it highly likely that the user would mess up his or her hair upon removing the Laschober headband from the user's head because the user is unable to release the tension of the headband from the frame prior to removing the device from the user's head.
Another structure of U.S. Pat. No. 4,930,885 to Laschober, shown in FIGS. 5 through 7 thereof, employs an attachment member comprising a wire forming a closed shape with break in the wire. One variation has a threaded nut which selectively bridges the break in the wire, but the other variation has overlapping halves that must be forced apart to remove the loop of the band from the wire. Again, the forcible separation of the overlapping ends of the wire appears to be difficult, if not impossible, to perform while the Laschober device is being worn by the user, and again it appears that the Laschober device would have to be removed from the user's head before the headband could be released from the frame.
What is clearly needed is an improved method and apparatus for holding the frames of eyeglasses in the proper position in front of the eyes, enabling the average user to more easily maintain the lenses of the eyeglasses at the proper distance and alignment with the eyes. Such a method and apparatus will provide the user with the desired fit and hold regardless of the amount of activity, perspiration or environmental conditions. Variations of such method and apparatus will also allow the average user interchangeability of securing components while offering a broad choice between different fashionable colors sizes and styles of straps (laces) and buckles.